Embattled Brooklyn District 15 Superintendent Frank DeStefano is expected to step down as early as next month, following charges of financial mismanagement, sources said yesterday.

“He will be out as early as Feb. 1,” said an official familiar with the brownstone district’s financial woes.

The source said Carmen Farino, principal of PS 6 on the Upper East Side and a 30-year education veteran, is a leading candidate to take over the job.

Schools Chancellor Harold Levy declined comment last night.

Levy’s office has just completed a sweeping audit of the financial mess at District 15, including a reported $1 million deficit.

Special Schools Investigator Ed Stancik is putting the final touches on a probe into “financial irregularities” in the district, said his spokeswoman, Susanna Chu.

DeStefano did not return a call for comment.

Members of District 15’s community school board said they’ve been waiting to hear from the chancellor regarding DeStefano’s fate.

“Neither Frank nor ‘Downtown’ [the Board of Education] has said anything to me,” said local-board President Mark Peters, a DeStefano ally.

Rumors of DeStefano’s departure have circulated for months but spread like wildfire through the district in the past few weeks. The district oversees schools in Boerum Hill, Cobble Hill, Park Slope, Kensington Park, Sunset Park and Red Hook.

The source said Levy wants DeStefano to “gracefully disappear” because of the numerous financial problems, and because of the hard-line enemies the superintendent has made among some administrators, teachers and parents in the district – including the chancellor’s budget director.

Among the problems, many first reported in The Post, are:

* Schools operating without $1 million in funds for arts programs or even basic supplies.

* Running up a $1 million deficit and not telling his board about it, and getting into a nasty feud with central budget director Beverly Donohue.

* Paying the superintendents and principals of Manhattan School District 2 in Manhattan a whopping $360,000 to train his district’s staff, when such training could have been provided for free.